


A Hundred Goodbyes

by MuddyBlood



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Hurt No Comfort, Psychological Horror, Time Loop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-02
Updated: 2020-03-02
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:47:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22980466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MuddyBlood/pseuds/MuddyBlood
Summary: Isharnai is as clever as she is cruel, and wouldn't settle for Beau just walking away; Jester isn't known for her good decision making when it comes to mysterious figures.
Relationships: Beauregard Lionett/Yasha, Jester Lavorre/Beauregard Lionett
Comments: 4
Kudos: 82





	A Hundred Goodbyes

There is something following Jester. It's quiet, and walks like one of the big cats of the jungle, but it has sad eyes that gleam in the dark; so she’s not scared. She asked it’s name one night, when the near-silent shuffling of feet was keeping her awake. It went still, the eyes disappearing back into the dark of the night, and so she doesn’t ask again. She gets the feeling she wouldn’t like the answer anyways. 

Sometimes she thinks Yasha can see it, a worried gleam in her eyes as the barbarian looks at her, but she never says anything. Jester wonders if she’s trying not to worry her; and it’s a nice enough thought that it makes Jester smile as soon as Yasha’s back is turned. 

It watches Molly too, from behind Jester. She can feel it studying him over her shoulder, following his movements with a powerful gaze, piercing blue eyes. It knows something that they don’t, Jester feels, and it makes her _ache_ with curiosity. She doesn’t talk to it though, somehow knowing that it wouldn’t respond even if it could.

It begins to cling to her even in the day, in the sun that it once shied from. It follows in her shadow, an echo of footsteps just after her own, breath on the back of her neck; it hangs close enough that she can feel it against her back as she walks. She stops looking for it, wondering if it will leave if she doesn’t watch it, wondering if she wants it to leave at all. She had always wanted a roommate, and Yasha doesn’t like staying with the others, so even this silent specter is a welcome addition to the dark of the room. 

So she bats her tail playfully through it when it gets too close, and talks to it after the Traveller leaves, weaving stories for it, and she can feel it listening, absorbing her words. Sometimes it feels like it’s giving her the stories, ones she never would have thought up. Wondrous tales of heroes and queens, soldiers and dragons, pirates and gods. It sits across from her and listens, and that’s never been enough for Jester before, but now it is; now that she knows it’s listening. She thinks it must be lonely, trapped in the shadows.

It never talks, even when it would be easier than vague gestures. It paces when it gets restless, and it’s eyes shine in interest. The shadows grow darker around it when it gets mad, its footsteps get louder when it gets excited. Hands appear sometimes now too, appearing from the shadows, trailing over the walls, and her paintings, and her little statues of the traveller. Nothing moves as it touches them, but Jester can feel it’s presence lingering. She starts calling it Blue, for the cobalt eyes and the sadness that clings to it like a shroud. 

It holds her hands, squeezes her shoulders, and carefully brushes her hair out of her face, deep in the bowels of a dungeon where she lay shackled; her only source of comfort in the dark. She knows it isn’t surprised by Molly’s death, but she doesn’t know how it saw it coming, seeing as how it was by her side the whole time in that dark cell. It just clings to her shoulders in support, and she swears that through her grief she can feel nails digging into her skin.

Yasha brings it up finally, weeks after they get out of that place. She takes Jester out to the balcony of her room, into the sun, and asks her if she knows that something follows her. Jester just grins, and tells her that Blue’s nice, and super friendly when you get to know it. If Yasha doesn’t believe her she doesn’t say anything, and Jester can feel Blue behind her, can imagine it’s hunched shoulders and a foot scuffing the floor. 

Blue starts getting more defined as weeks drag on. Jester knows it’s a she now, and that she ripples with strength, appearing in glimpses from the shadows that hold her. She reaches for Jester often, and Jester can barely see a frown appear every time the hand goes through her. She tries to grin extra big to make up for it, but she doesn’t think it helps. 

Once, when Jester sits to tell her a story like she always does, it comes out different. She planned on telling Blue about Oskar and Genevieve and their adventures and falling in love, but instead she talks about an evil, terrible witch that cursed a great hero. Jester never heard the ending to that story, and Blue didn’t try to finish it. 

A long, long time later, when Blue is almost a full person and Jester knows so much more, is so much stronger; their ragtag group finds a witch, the one that cursed Nott. Jester remembers the story Blue told her, and thinks she knows how it ends.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There is something following Jester. It's quiet, and is hunched under the weight of some great sadness, but it has kind eyes that gleam in the dark; so she’s not scared. She asked it’s name one night, when the near-silent shuffling of feet was keeping her awake. It went still, the eyes disappearing back into the dark of night, and she didn’t ask again. She gets the feeling she used to know the answer anyways, once upon a time.

There is someone following Jester, but she forgets to be scared every time.


End file.
